


you could be the king (but watch the queen conquer)

by thegirl



Series: when i am king, you shall be queen [4]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Childbirth, F/M, Jealousy, Sibling Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-23
Updated: 2015-07-23
Packaged: 2018-04-10 20:33:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4406531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegirl/pseuds/thegirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>King Tommen Baratheon, First of His Name, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, King of the Andals, the First Men and the Rhoynar takes a deep breath and walks toward the room where his first child will be born.</p>
<p>And towards the sound of his wife’s screaming.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Fourth installment in the series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	you could be the king (but watch the queen conquer)

Tommen knows it is expected he stay out of the room.

The birthing bed, he’s always been told, is something women must brave on their own, surrounded only by fellow members of the fairer sex. Men do not stick around for the unpleasantness - why, his own kingly father was hunting when he and each of his siblings were brought into the world.

Queens were not alone as other, poorer women were either - Tommen had seen a veritable army of midwives, ladies-in-waiting and servants go into the room with his wife and not one emerge.

He is not needed, he knows. Arya is the strongest woman he’s ever know - childbirth will not fell her, he knows it in his very bones.

And yet...

Tommen knows if he does not enter the room then Arya may never forgive him.

So King Tommen Baratheon, First of His Name, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, King of the Andals, the First Men and the Rhoynar takes a deep breath and walks toward the room where his first child will be born.

And towards the sound of his wife’s screaming.

.

Tommen thinks Arya has probably broken his hand the way she’s squeezing it, but he doesn’t dare complain, not while the woman he loves is going through such agony just to bring his child into the world.

They’ve been there for sixteen hours, and if Tommen who has been able to get his head down for at least a couple of naps is exhausted, Arya is half dead with fatigue.

“Come on,” he tells her, for what feels like the thousandth time, the encouraging words feeling empty because he’s run out of other things to say, “Just a little more, a little more, you’re almost there love, you’re so, so close-”

“It hurts,” she wails, inconsolable “Cut it out, cut it out-”

“We can’t,” Tom tells her, and kisses her forehead covered in beads of sweat, and brushes her hair back from her eyes, feeling utterly useless.

“I’m dying,” Arya groans, “It hurts so much. I’m dying, I’m dying-”

“No,” Tommen says “The septas say you’re doing fine, the pain will end, you need to push-”

“I can’t,” Arya cries, “I can’t-”

“You can, you _can_ -”

At that moment, Arya lets out a primal scream that to Tom’s ears barely sounds human - it comes from the back of her throat and after she barely pauses for breath before letting out another desperate howl of agony.

Tommen’s platitudes are lost in the sound, but Arya uses his left hand as an anchor and he lets out a curse of his own, but nobody reacts. Every eye is on Arya.

Tom can’t see anything, and doesn’t want to but he hears in the moment Arya pauses to draw breath three things: a squelching noise, the sound of a young lady’s body hitting the floor as she collapses in a dead faint as the sight and a baby’s cry.

Arya cries noisily, saying _thank the gods, thank you, thank the gods, over, over, it’s over, thank the gods_ and Tommen has barely managed to extract his limp hand from Arya’s death grip when a tiny, bloody, wriggling baby is thrust into his arms.

Tom stares at it and it stares at him, before the baby - his baby - takes another breath and continues crying at the new big world it has been so abruptly catapulted into.

“A healthy boy, your Grace,” the head midwife tells him, relief etched into every line of her aged face.

“Hello,” Tommen says to the still bawling infant - his son (he has a son, an heir, Arya had given him a son) has a squashed face, no hair, blood and gunk smeared all over his body, and he doesn’t look a thing like a price, but Tommen thinks he’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.

“Arya,” he turns to his wife, who is still crying tears of relief that the labour is over, her face all red and blotchy from the difficulty of the delivery and the pain, “We have a son.”

Arya nods, panting, and reaches out to run a finger down the baby’s chubby cheek. “That’s nice,” she says, before her hand drops and her eyes close, her breathing almost instantly evening out.

Tommen ends up creeping out of the room with all the other birthing attendants, all knowing if any of them woke the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms from her much deserved rest then it would be on pain of death.

.

“Perhaps Tywin,” Mother suggests at dinner the next day, and Tommen almost chokes on the roast pheasant.

“No,” he says empathetically.

Mother’s eyes narrow. “Then what? Your grandfather was one of the greatest me to live, does he not deserve a namesake?”

“I just-” Tommen begins, mind racing for a reason Mother would buy other than the obvious - he murdered Arya’s mother and brother - as she would call him soft, or too influenced by his wife’s views. Though, she said the latter often enough anyway. “We agreed we didn’t want him named after a dead man. We don’t want him to have a great name to live up to, but instead to forge his own destiny.”

They of course had agreed no such thing, but Tom felt his wife would support him when he told her he was saving their son from being named after a monster.

Mother thins her lips, but nods, before downing some wine. When he’s sure she’s otherwise occupied, Tommen releases the breath he’s been holding.

“I’ve missed this,” Mother tells him, and Tom frowns.

“Missed what?”

“Just... me and you, eating dinner. Alone.”

Tommen grits his teeth “Arya will be back soon, Pycelle says that she’s making a quick recovery from the birth.”

“Yes,” Mother says, biting out the words “How fortunate.”

The rest of the meal passes in silence, and Tommen wonders how long he would have been fooled by his mother’s mask had it not been pointed out to him.

**.**

“Jon,” Arya says the first time she holds their son without help, three days after his birth. “His name is Jon.”

Tommen smiles at the wonder in her eyes as she gazes down onto the serene face of their sleeping son, and tries to commit the moment to memory. He wants to remember it forever.

“Like your brother?” Tom asks, and Arya nods.

Tommen had suspected as much. He knew about the bond between Arya and Jon Snow, her favourite brother. Her bastard brother. Her _last_ brother.

“We can say it’s in homage to my grandmother, Joanna, if questioned,” Tommen says and Arya looks at him with stars in her eyes.

He hopes when Jon’s eyes change colour from baby blue, that they are grey.

.

Crown Prince Jon Baratheon is three weeks old for his naming ceremony, and sleeps the whole way through, thanks to a night spent screaming for his mother, for his father, for milk, and for his mother again.

And whilst it is acceptable for the little prince to nap through the ceremony, his parents have no such luxury.

“I feel like I’m going to keel over,” Arya murmurs to Tom as the most recent High Septon, full of a healthy fear of the Crown, says the necessary prayers over their son.

“We’ll go to bed after this,” Tommen says.

“And give Jon over to some wetnurse,” Arya expands on the dream.

“Just us,” Tom promises.

At that moment, the Crown Prince of the Seven Kingdoms stirs, and shifts position.

His parents freeze, staring warily at their offspring. They slowly relax after a couple of minutes, but don’t dare so much as move again in case he is roused by the motion.

“That was close-” Tommen breathes, but is cut off by the roar of the crowd as the ceremony comes a close, all the lords and ladies in attendance rising to their feet.

“Shit.” Arya curses as Jon’s eyes pop wide open, and he takes a breath before starting to wail.

**.**

Letters announcing the birth of the heir to Westeros are sent far and wide over his future dominion - to the North and South, East and West. Every keep’s informed, every noble now knowing of the birth and the name of their future liege, and the bells ring up and down the country for a full day.

The letters are written mainly by maesters, pages and scribes, simply copying down the king’s words. But one is different.

To Castle Black goes a letter from one end of the continent to the other, carried by the strongest raven in the Red Keep. Instead of being written by an underling, it is scribed by Queen Arya’s own hand, and is written to her brother.

_My dearest Jon, my first son is named after you,_ the letter reads, _and if he is half as good a man as you, these Seven Kingdoms shall prosper under his rule. I miss you. I love you. Tom is very good to me. Always know I love you. Your little sister._

Jon Snow keeps it with him until the end of his days.

**Author's Note:**

> Please read, review and leave kudos if you enjoyed reading this! Also, if anyone knows any song titles with king and/or queen in please say because I'm running out!


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